CBS Evening News

Who Is WikiLeaks' Founder Julian Assange?

The fallout from WikiLeaks' posting of secret diplomatic cables continues as the state department has moved to stop the leaks by tightening access to its computer files.

CBS News correspondent Elizabeth Palmer reports on Tuesday, the Wikileaks website was attacked by unknown hackers. WikiLeaks' founder, Julian Assange, told Time magazine Sec. of State Hillary Clinton should resign if it's proved she ordered American diplomats to spy on U.N. officials.

As for Assange, he's in hiding. He's made plenty of enemies. Love him or loathe him, he provokes passionate debate.

Assange was born in Townsville, Australia, in 1971, raised by his mother and said to be fiercely intelligent.

He was homeschooled and a skilled computer hacker while still in his teens.

By 2007 he had founded WikiLeaks to expose bureaucratic secrets globally but it was in 2010 that he and the site rocketed to fame with a video posted online showing an attack on Iraqi insurgents that killed both journalists and civilians.

Assange stepped into the spotlight to defend the leak and the rumor mill went wild calling him a control freak who slept in a different place every night.

Elizabeth Palmer has been a CBS News correspondent since August 2000. She has been based in London since late 2003, after having been based in Moscow (2000-03). Palmer reports primarily for the "CBS Evening News."